IOSR Journal of Research & Method in Education (IOSR-JRME)

e- ISSN: 2320–7388,p-ISSN: 2320–737X Volume 8, Issue 3 Ver. III (May. – June. 2018), PP 37-43
www.iosrjournals.org

Virtual Museum Production in the School:

a didactic-pedagogic experience for African studies
Larissa de Souza Reis*, Alfredo Eurico Rodrigues Matta** Francisca de Paula
Santos da Silva***
Abstract: The text exposes the process of construction of the Virtual Museum of African Stories and Itan
(MUCAI), available at: http://museuafricaqui.wixsite.com/mucai, resulting from the research due to UNEB's
Masters degree in Education and Contemporaneity, developed in the period from 2015 to 2017 and patented at
a municipal school of Salvador city, with groups of the 4th year of the Fundamental Teaching I. The
investigation used the applied research entitled Design Based Research (DBR), having as base the collaborative
engagement with children from 9 to 12 years, through iterative procedural cycles. The work used storytelling,
artistic productions workshops with drawings and theater, besides the creation of the portal resulting from the
pedagogic practices. The discussed study has social-educative relevance for dialoguing with the field of the
praxis around the curriculum of the Education of the Ethnic-racial Relationships, besides the sharing of this
didactic-pedagogic material with professionals of the area and others concerned with, by the valorization of the
History and of the Afro-Brazilian Culture.
Palavras-chave: Virtual museum, African Stories, Itan, DBR, Didatic Material
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Date of Submission: 02-06-2018 Date of acceptance: 18-06-2018
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I. Introduction
This article brings considerations concerning the possibilities offered by the Virtual Environment of
Learning (AVA) to the process of confrontation of the ideological barriers that disapprove the diffusion of the
History and Afro-Brazilian Culture in the social-educative extent. For that we defend a teaching-learning
process that offers the knowledge of the other peers starting from the valorization of our own ancestral root, for
we understand that the implementation of the Law no. 10.639/03 doesn't please all the ones involved in the
educational process. With this, we place an alert for the need of recognition and preservation of the rights of
African descendants upon learning other versions of the History, besides those spread in the text books that were
written by an elitist culture of european inheritance.
In such context, we bring as a cutout the experience occurred in the research work entitled Virtual
Museum of African Stories and Itan: contributions to the implementation of the Law 10.639/03, developed with
children of the 4th year of the Fundamental Teaching I of a public school of Salvador city (NANNY). the school
institution is located in the area of Beiru, adjacent to the Cabula neighborhood. We opted for the study around

*
Master in Education and Contemporaneity by the Postgraduate Program in Education and Contemporaneity
(PPGEduC) from University of the State of Bahia (UNEB). Pedagogue formed by UNEB. Specialist in Art,
Education and Contemporary Technologies from University of Brasilia (UnB). Member of the Search Group
Network Society, Cultural Plurality and Educational Digital Content. E-mail: larireiss@hotmail.com
**
Doctor in Education formed by Federal University of Bahia (UFBA). Professor of the University of the State
of Bahia (UNEB). University professor by the Postgraduate Program in Education and Contemporaneity
(PPGEduC) and the Doctorate Multi-institutional and Multidisciplinary in Diffusion of Knowledge – DMMDC.
Coordination of the History course UNEB/UAB and the nucleus ABED-Bahia. Leader of the Search Group
Network Society, Cultural Plurality and Educational Digital Content. E-mail: alfredomatta@gmail.com
***
Doctor in Education formed by Federal University of Bahia (UFBA). Professor of the University of the State
of Bahia (UNEB). University professor by the Postgraduate Program in Education and Contemporaneity
(PPGEduC) and the Doctorate Multi-institutional and Multidisciplinary in Diffusion of Knowledge – DMMDC.
Leader of the Search Group Multidisciplinary Solidarity Society, Education, Space and Tourism (SSEETU). E-
mail: fcapaula@gmail.com

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 Virtual Museum Production in the School: a didactic-pedagogic experience for African studies

the banto and iorubá histories due to historical relationship that Cabula has with the banto people and Beiru
with the Yorubá civilization. With that we emphasize that the project looked for ways to the valorization of the
History and Afro-Brazilian Culture through the literature offered by the African stories and Itan, in way to result
at a museum while historical portal, social-educative, social-constructivist and transdisciplinary.
This text is organized in the following way: initially, we dialogued on our referential of virtual
museum, linked our proposal, in way to articulate the existent relationship between the produced resource and
the progresses of the didactic-pedagogic offered facing the existent curricular context; soon afterwards, we
explained the methodological way that we used in the pedagogic applications of the project with the
methodology DBR; to proceed, we defend the relevance of the rescue of the African-Brazilian memory through
the information and communication technologies, in a way to disseminate the knowledge brought by the
Africans through the oral tradition; finally, we expose the conclusion.
.
II. VIRTUAL MUSEUM AND AVA: A Proposal Of Participative Registration For Valorization Of
The African-Brazilian Inheritance
FRThe presence of the African ancestry in Brazil is well-known, considering the historical context of
the enslavement of african people that was caused by the european colonization in brazilian lands (SILVÉRIO,
2013). This way, ancestral families belonging to civilizations as: iorubás, gêges, fanti-ashanti, islamized, bantos
and mozambicans were violated, being pulled out of their lands in that episode. Regard Bahia, we noticed
indications of the African diaspora that reached the area of Salvador city, with the predominance of the bantos
and iorubás.
In this perspective, we consider around the consequent dissatisfaction of the lack of a current
valorization of the African-Brazilian ancestry for the school education which has resulted in the lack of
pedagogic processes that can respond to building a more significant teaching-learning. This picture has been
contributing to the stereotype construction that have been affecting the black culture through ideologies
registered in text books, besides speeches spread in social-educative places (SILVA, 2010). This way, the
students have been learning about the cultural diversity through a uncontextualized curriculum and colonized by
the european continuations, without, however, appreciating their own ethnic-racial roots.
We consider that the elaboration of virtual museums, while expressions of new languages, it can
generate data bases that are pertinent to the process of teaching-learning of the History (MATTA, 2014), which
can wake up educators' involvement and other people interested in this perspective. Besides, there is the
possibility of achieving the registration of the memory heading for its preservation and at the same time,
promotion and approach of dialogues with the community involved in the process. We emphasize that the
museum was built for beyond the storage view, for promoting the vision of a didactic-pedagogic portal aimed at
a transdisciplinary and social-constructivist vision. This way, the virtual environment of learning was result of
an educational, collaborative, innovative and authorial work.
Considering our role of having produced a museum as didactic material for On-line Education (EAD),
we prioritized certain orientations aimed at the pedagogic quality of the portal, that is: valorization of the
students' previous knowledge and incentive to the same ones for new researches starting from the discussions
promoted at classroom; the students' incentive in the access to AVA, in way to mediate pedagogically the
interactions among the peers, besides the interactivities of the same ones in the portal (ZANETTI, 2017). Also,
we emphasize the importance of the promotion of the dialogue with the trainees and the possibility of we
accomplish evaluations and self-evaluations around the occurred learnings.
We believe in the importance of the use of the technologies in classroom, considering its progresses
and contributions generated by human applicabilities that have been created by a social-technical development
(LEITE, 2011). In this view we looked for the use of the medias in educational extents of collaborative way,
heading for the pedagogic contributions to the involved students. We suggest, in this walking that the people of
the school and the other professionals engaged in this cause can approach, in way to build partnerships that seek
the creation of educational projects as this. Regard the Education for the Ethnic-racial Relationships, the virtual
museum appears as a portal of sharing of several medias, in way to interact with the infantile public, besides
other ages and to accompany the needs audiovisual communicational needs of our contemporary society.
In this perspective, we defend the movement of preservation of the African-Brazilian ancestral
knowledge, immersed in the field of the orality, in the sense of registering it in materials as museum, in order to
value it and to disseminate it in several social-educative places, in approach with the recognition of the
descendants of Africans historical presence in Brazil. This way, this work assisting the presented reflections, it
exposes the study on use of the approach of a virtual museum as didactic-pedagogic procedure, aimed to
teaching-learning of the African ancestry in Bahia, having as existence registration the pedagogic applications
rendered at a school of the area of Cabula and Beiru neighborhood.

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 Virtual Museum Production in the School: a didactic-pedagogic experience for African studies

III. MUCAI: dialog and methodology practice DBR in the Beiru community
The referred virtual museum was planned and developed based on a social-constructivist and dialogic
perspective, for we understand that the community notion goes through an united collaborative learning that is
submerged in social-cultural relationships that walk in elapsing of the interactions among the peers and of these
with the texts and contexts dialogued. We emphasize that any subject can build a museum in this walking,
although we have an appreciation more deepened with the developed project due to our academic analysis while
researchers engaged in future possibilities in the social-constructivist extent. Our concern is motivating
educators, students and other interested parties to produce virtual museums in partnership with their
communities.
In this regard, MUCAI results of methodological course that follows the Design Based Research (DBR)
(MATTA, SILVA, BOAVENTURA, 2014), translated as Research in Development. We believe in the proposal
of DBR for the possibility of use of the qualitative nature that it can also act together with the quantitative
perspective, in a compatibility with projects engaged in collaborative actions close to the community of
involved learning, being these valued of the point of view of the authorship and of the focused being, differently
of the researches that looks for the community as an I object of study. DBR possesses four phases and it allows
the applicability of actions on site of the research, in way to act through iterative cycles, so that we get to
execute the first cycle until the culmination of the project that resulted in the dissertation.
Our investigation analyzed the pedagogic use of the virtual museum of African stories and itan, in the
fundamental teaching level I, in way to contribute to the implementation of the Law no. 10.639/03. We
researched and selected some African narratives of banto and Yoruba origins and we valued the teachings and
values brought in the texts, so that, amid the process we observed how the applicability of the museum revealed
educational contributions to the subject of the research. This way, our project followed four phases drawn by
DBR: 1 - contextual deepening regarding the on site report of the investigation; 2 - planning of the practical
solution starting from the selection of the theoretical principles, in way to draw the first protal modelling; 3 -
application of the educational practices through iterative cycles; and 4 - development of the praxis starting from
the actions already developed, in way to improve the initiatives and improve propositions to the other
intervention cycles.
Initially, we analyzed the exposed problem, starting from the deepened study of the historical context
on site of the research (Salvador / Cabula / Beiru) and of the state of the art engaged with the literary universe of
the African-Brazilian stories. In this walking, we looked for the learning community in syntony with the choice
of the application place, in way to build social-constructivist and collaborative partnerships. Our involvement
with the institution was built in previous projects, which strengthened our work bringing practical and
constructive devolutions to the involved people.
The second phase involved the ripening in the search for theoretical principles that approach the
project mission, considering our defense of valorization of History and Afro-Brazilian Culture, from the
legislation orientations of the Law no. 10.639/03 and the Curricular National Parameters aimed at the cultural
plurality. We opted for the continuation of the notions to the work with: the africanities; the African narratives
of oral tradition; the legal bases for investment in the Afro-Brazilian theme addressed to the Fundamental
Teaching I; the languages; the interactions among the peers and finally, the technologies. We just used some of
the referentials studied for application in the first cycle, as use possibility in the first action according to the
available time for the accomplishment of the research in the extent of the masters degree, in way to invest in the
other theoretical notions in the next application stages.
The third moment of the investigation approached the development of pedagogic practices in
classroom, elaborated from the literary and artistic study of the selected narratives. For that, we organized our
actions in agreement with: the telling of the histories; the occurrence of workshops and the collaborative
production of the museum. We highlight that MUCAI was elaborated as a process and it resulted in a didactic-
pedagogic material that was produced by the students along the encounters: from the reflexive writings of the
studies on the texts to the artistic productions.
The readings of the stories and itan were distributed in along the encounters, in way to begin, to
interlace and to contain dialogues with the students, through learnings on lessons and values spread in the
literatures of this nature. As an example, the participant students of our project dialogued and they learned with
stories loaded of explanatory plot of the mythology of the African divinities, the orixás and besides, the itan that
deal with changes wakened up from within to outside; the respect to the other from to listen and to await the
time of speaking, besides the subject of the interior beauty and of the valorization of the family as a treasure of
great value.
We applied four workshops in classroom, named that one of drawing; that one of hand objects and
symbols of the orixás; that one of African divinities costumes, finally, that one of improvisational games. The
first workshop involved activities of drawings on characters appreciated in the reading of the story O Caçador
do Povo (The Hunter of the People) that faced the tenebrous bird (PRANDI, 2002), through materials as colored
pencil, hydrocolor pen and wax chalk. The second workshop was performed with the raising of the students'
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 Virtual Museum Production in the School: a didactic-pedagogic experience for African studies

previous knowledge concerning the mythologies already studied in the narratives in classroom, also those
already known by the same ones. This way, we studied the armaments of the orixás, using the same resources of
the initial workshop, also elements as papers, adhesive tape, paints and colored glíter glues. The workshop of
orixás' garments was improved when we increase to it resources items as rubberized, strings, wools and ribbons
of several colors, in correspondence to the clothes of the divinities. The theatrical games, in its turn, were
accomplished in continuation to the study of all of the stories and itan that the apprentices studied at classroom,
from the autonomy of the same ones for us to choose one of them for their theatrical performances, using the
improvisation through the sticks and of the voice. We emphasize that our work of performance was rendered in
continuation to the transdisciplinary, collaborative and social-constructivist notions. Along the creative process
in classroom, we digitalized the materials produced at the workshops, according to illustration to proceed,
besides the other school activities for dissemination in our portal.

Illustration 01 - Artistic productions of the project workshops

Source:
http://museuafricaqui.wixsite.com/mucai/aula-03;
http://museuafricaqui.wixsite.com/mucai/aula-04;
http://museuafricaqui.wixsite.com/mucai/aula-05;
http://museuafricaqui.wixsite.com/mucai/aula-06.

In this aspect, two groups of 4th year of a public school of Beiru evaluated and patented MUCAI, while
participants of the course of teaching-learning of our didactic-pedagogic proposal: to learn from African stories
and itan. Our museum was created by the students together with the conductor of the groups, while collaborative
and authorial creation. In this regard, the production of MUCAI was developed from the following sections in
the virtual page: on the museum, collection of narratives, accessibility, media, interactive room, diary of the
classes, pedagogic orientation and collaborators. We presented our mission, the target public, the histories
(authorized for publication in the portal), resulting elements of the students' productions and accessible
resources as audio of the narrations. We emphasize that the referred applications joined the first cycle and, for
that the museum is in constant procedural development. However, the improvement of our didactic-pedagogic
work is happening for beyond an academic project and with that we are already in the second cycle, with the
dissemination of the site in the social networks, with the initial intention of diffusing this knowledge, besides
mobilizing educators, students and other people interested in this cause.

IV. Redemptiom Of The Ancestral Memory Of Stories And Itan Through The Technology
Our approach on the African-Brazilian histories is due the identification with the narratives of oral
tradition, originating from of the culture brought by the Africans that were brought to Brazil in the period of the
enslavement. The orality appears, in this aspect, as starting point for the sharing of knowledge immersed in
African civilizations, while source of the teaching-learning for children, young people, adults and seniors. This

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 Virtual Museum Production in the School: a didactic-pedagogic experience for African studies

way, we understand the African stories under the view of the oral tradition (MACHADO, 2005) that is present
in the Candomblé religion, while memory of the diaspora. We appreciate the pedagogic glance of the stories,
considering the basement brought by it with teachings and values that are relevant for the life of the involved
people in the process, with prominence: to the invigoration of the family ties; of respect to the elder; of
valorization of self-knowledge and to the ancestors' know-how.
Itan is a word of nagô origin used to represent any narrative of this nature, so that it is pronounced in
the singular and plural in the same way (MACHADO, 2005). Among the characters of the histories we can find
animals, vegetables, human beings and also mythological, composing a plot loaded of lessons for life, be it
contextualized in comic or sober situations. We consider that, with this, children, young people, adults and
seniors can tell and/or read an itan, since the approached message is of easy access to the understanding in
agreement with their learning levels and life experiences.
In this perspective, the voice was one of the technologies used in the storytellings in classroom and
museum, as virtual learning environment, it represented the technological empowering way in the histories
dissemination of studied oral tradition , seeking the development of a more accessible communication in
fighting with racial prejudice. DBR, as elaboration texture and organization of our actions has been
strengthening the pedagogic approach with the learning community, in way we recognize the importance of
looking for new educational proposals to the curricular field of the africanities in the schools.

V. Experimented African-Brazilian Histories

The Virtual Museum of African Histories and Itan results from a social-constructivist production that
brings us registrations of fundamental didactic-pedagogic experiences for dialogue around the potentials of this
material, seeking the fight against the racial prejudice in social-educative extents. With this intention we
exhibited some cuttings of the students' productions in along the developed activities in the school context. For
that we exhibited some aspects that were collected with instruments as: the school blackboard and the virtual
participation of the apprentices in the museum.
We emphasize that the name and the acronym of the virtual environment represent a democratic
involvement that was defined through dialogues and voting among the students. The initial page of MUCAI
portrays the fruit of a planning authorial, creative and participative close to the community of involved learning.
We disseminated colors, drawings and paintings related to the context of the selected African people and to the
characters studied along the tellings of African-Brazilian histories in classroom, so that the creations were
elaborated by the students and researcher, according to illustration below:

Illustration 02 - Initial Page of the museum

Fonte: http://museuafricaqui.wixsite.com/mucai
We used the school blackboard during the pedagogic practices of the project, with the intention of
registering the presence of the orality along the dialogic process in classroom, on the point of view of the
studied narratives. This way, we detected doubts, curiosities and the students' learnings in relation to the
deepened texts. As an example, we socialized the speeches collected during the study of the itan A Mudança e o
Coração (The Change and The Heart) (PÓVOAS, 2004), according to illustration below.

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 Virtual Museum Production in the School: a didactic-pedagogic experience for African studies

Illustration 03 - Picture of the school blackboard

Source: 4th year classroom blackboard

In this aspect, starting from the writings in the blackboard and the reflections that were logged in the
investigator's logbook, we detailed elements that were discussed by the students from the involvement with the
referred itan. We stimulate the students' reaction for possible indications on the next events of the history and
for that we made some pauses along the reading, with sentences of the kind "what do you think has happened
later on?". Besides, we mediate the process of the students' learning in relation to words ignored by some of
them, such as 'conselho' (advice) and 'aconselhar' (advising), also including the sense not only of aid as well as
of a meeting composed by members, which involved the context of the appreciated narrative. Considering that
the approach of the history taught us the importance of sowing subjective changes within the heart to reach our
actions, especially when it involves situations that need a work together, we provoked the students to point out
the morals of the itan and we heard sentences of the kind "each one has to change too", what offers us an
effective visualization that narratives of this nature contribute to the educational process of the people in a
transdisciplinary perspective , with the valorization of teachings and values that cross the walls of the school and
invade the daily life.
The students' virtual participation in MUCAI was demarcated as being a source of the authors' creative
development in the school, built amidst the interactions in classroom, besides the interactivity in the portal. In
this perspective, the apprentices of the two groups appreciated their friends' productions, they were valued by
the peers while artists and they diffused teachings on African studies through the technology. With this, known
and unknown people can visualize and consider about the relevance of building new educational solutions on
behalf of measures of combat to the depreciation of the African-Brazilian culture, so that the interactive room of
the museum points out sentences that reveal the desire of transformation of this reality for the involved people
themselves, with words as respect, rights, prejudice, skin color and black conscience.

VI. Conclusion
The proposal of our museum goes through the valorization of a pedagogy that looks for the perspective
of decolonisation (LUZ, 2013), for we consider that existent curricular approach in the school contexts has still
been affected by the europeanizing culture that, in its turn, needs to be combated in an educational and
conscious way. We visualize that on dealing with our in site investigation - Salvador (NANNY), more
especially in a school located at Beiru, Cabula area, the production of a contextualized AVA with the history of
the place, was relevant to the development of a more significant learning to the involved people. We suggest, in
this regard, the re-discussion of the school curriculum on the part of the educators involved in each learning
community, considering the local realities of their teaching institutions.

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 Virtual Museum Production in the School: a didactic-pedagogic experience for African studies

We believe that the presented virtual museum offers social-educative contributions to the teaching
field, to the research and related extension on the theme of the africanities, so that the existence of MUCAI
makes possible that educators and other interested parties in this proposal re-analyze the available didactic
materials regarding the teaching of the Ethnic-racial Relationships. With this, the valorization of the History and
Afro-Brazilian Culture acquires a dimension that goes beyond the walls of the school, for connecting a diversity
of people of several parts of Brazil.
Thus, considering the presence of an institutionalization of know-how that is submerged in the
contemporary society that has hidden the knowledge of the African-Brazilian culture, we looked for the opening
of dialogues, suggestions and sharing among educators willing to firm the commitment of the education to the
local research communities. The referred museum appears as one of the countless possibilities that the educator
can plan their pedagogic practices, seeking the combat to racial prejudice in the schools. Finally, the technology
appears as a bridge for dialogues and sharing of know-how among several educators in communities.

Notes
[1]. LEITE, Lígia Silva. Mídia e a perspectiva da tecnologia educacional no processo pedagógico contemporâneo. IN: FREIRE, Wendel
(org.). Tecnologia e educação: as mídias na prática docente. Rio de Janeiro: Wak Ed., 2011. p. 61-70.
[2]. LUZ, Narcimária Correia do Patrocínio. Descolonização e Educação – por uma Epistemologia Africano-Brasileira. IN: LUZ,
Narcimária Correia do Patrocínio (org.). Descolonização e educação: diálogos e proposições metodológicas. Curitiba, PR: CRV,
2013. p. 22-23.
[3]. MACHADO, Vanda. “Mitos afro-brasileiros e vivências educacionais”. IN: SECULT. Lei n°10.639/03: caderno de textos do
professor. Salvador: Smec, 2005.v. 1, p. 1-12.
[4]. MATTA, Alfredo Eurico Rodrigues. “Novas Linguagens para a História”. Revista do Instituto Histórico e Geográfico Brasileiro.
Rio de Janeiro: IHGB. Ano 175, n. 464, p. 267-290 jul./set. 2014.
[5]. MATTA, Alfredo Eurico Rodrigues; SILVA, Francisca de Paula Rodrigues da; BOAVENTURA, Edivaldo Machado. “Design-
Based Research ou Pesquisa de Desenvolvimento: metodologia para pesquisa aplicada de inovação em educação do século
XXI”. Revista da FAEEBA: Educação e Contemporaneidade. Salvador: UNEB, v. 23, n.42, p. 23-36, july./december. 2014.
[6]. PÓVOAS, Ruy do Carmo. Itan de Boca a Ouvido. Ilhéus: UESC, 2004. p. 7; p. 29-30.
[7]. PRANDI, Reginaldo. Ifá, o adivinho: histórias dos deuses africanos que vieram para o Brasil com os escravos. São Paulo:
Companhia das Letrinhas, 2002. p. 20-25.
[8]. SILVA, Ana Célia da. Desconstruindo a discriminação do negro no livro didático. Salvador: EDUFBA, 2010. p. 21.
[9]. SILVÉRIO, Valter Roberto (Ed.). Síntese da coleção história geral da África: Pré-história ao século XVI. Brasília: UNESCO,
MEC, UFSCar, 2013. p. 13.
[10]. ZANETTI, Alexsandra. “Elaboração de Materiais Didáticos para Educação a Distância”. Biblioteca Virtual do NEAD. Minas
Gerais: UFJF. Available at: <http://www.cead.ufjf.br/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/media_biblioteca_elaboracao_materiais.pdf>.
Checked in may 09, 2017. p. 93-112

Larissa de Souza Reis "Virtual Museum Production in the School: a didactic-pedagogic

experience for African studies” IOSR Journal of Research & Method in Education (IOSR-
JRME) , vol. 8, no. 3, 2018, pp. 37-43.

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